Tuesday, September 14, 2010

OK, it's safe to come back now.

The ugly bugs will be here no more, I'm kicking my hornet habit and resisting the temptation to tell you all about the one I saw today, first having heard it, chomping wood from an old plank at the bottom of the garden, or of how my very brave friend A reported seeing a bunch of them drunk on sap on one of her ash trees, then got so fed up with one that kept coming and swiping honeybees from her sedum flowers that she swatted it into a jam jar and saw to its demise.  It's helped a bit, learning and talking about them, but I don't find them really any less repellent, and Tom's threatened to stop reading this if I don't stop creeping him out about them, and I don't suppose he's the only one who feels that way.  But sometimes it seems like you just have to stay with horrible and uncomfortable things for a bit.  Not forever, though.

So just to take away the taste of chewed wasp, here's a collage and some Rilke .  No one does autumn better than Rainer-Maria.



Blue Hydrangea

These leaves are like the last green
in the paint pots - dried up, dull and rough,
behind the flowered umbels whose blue
is not their own, but mirrored from afar.

They reflect it tear-stained, vaguely
as if deep down they hoped to lose it;
and as with old blue writing paper
there's yellow in them, violet and grey;

Washed out as on a child's pinafore,
things that are finished with, no longer worn:
the way one feels a small life's brevity.

But suddenly emotion seems to flare
in one of the umbels, and one sees
a moving blue as it takes joy in green.

(From New Poems, 1907,  trans. Snow.  In German you can find it here

 I feel the italics are a bit of pedantic overkill, but if I don't use them someone will inevitably skip read and think I wrote it.  As if.  In my dreams.)

7 comments:

Kelly said...

OK I'm inspired to take a walk this afternoon with the camera to capture some of local beauty. Although a line from a book, of which I can't remember the name, "We are not here to capture an image, we are here to maintain one." Pictures coming soon.

christopher said...

I would follow you anywhere! :D

Zhoen said...

The most interesting colors linger there.

Sorry, I just can't enjoy bugs. I respect them, I know they are necessary and amazing and all. But, enjoy? A flaw in me, no doubt.

Anonymous said...

Love the 'hornet habit' and love that we've finally seen the stinging back ends of them! Shhhhhiver ...

The Crow said...

But, you did write it, dear Lucy, with your wonderful collage that mirrored his words.

(The creepiest part of reading the Wikipedia article about the Japanese hornets was the part about how the scent of a sting draws even more of them to the victim. Oh, dear God in heaven - as if I didn't have enough just looking at them to cause nightmares, Wikipedia has added angst to the power of infinity to my slumber! Having said all that, though, I loved your hornet posts, Lucy.)

Jean said...

Lovely photos - I'm a big fan of hydrangeas, especially blue, and I did not know this poem. Thank you.

I liked the hornets too, though. I guess I'm not creeped out by insects, though their various insistent noises sometimes drive me to distraction.

the polish chick said...

one of my favourite flowers! thank you.